Bad Phanphic PoTO Album
by Soignante
Summary: My caricature of typical Very Bad Phanphics, beginning with the Harlequin Romance Gerik version. The 4th chapter is up. Ever hear the one about the two phans who went back in time?
1. The Harlequin Cliche

**One Snapshot of a Very Bad Phic**

Christine, who was beautiful and perfect and yet somehow incredibly naïve, childish, and submissive, woke up one morning on a great silver swan-shaped bed in a puddle of red and black silk sheets (no matter how garish that would look in reality). She felt very weak, but that was only natural, considering that she'd been so very sick. (It was an illness of unknown origin, including some, if not all, of the following symptoms: high fever, delirium, cold sweats, chills, weakness, weight loss, and prolonged periods of unconsciousness. Be it noted that there is no mention of bedpans or incontinence, though the illness can last anywhere from days to weeks.) She was inexplicably dressed in a white (always white – if not red – just imagine the symbolism. It's so deep.) negligee, which exposed more than it covered. She wondered who had dressed her, though she wasn't terribly concerned about this person's choice of clothing or why this person happened to possess a negligee in her size – or why this person owned a swan bed and so forth.

Just as she was wondering this, she happened to hear strains of the most beautiful music she had ever heard in her life. The music went a long way towards answering her silent question – or would have done, if she hadn't fallen into a weird trance and wandered helplessly out the door into the lair. Yes, the lair. Following the sound of the pipe organ music, Christine made her way to the room (unspecified, but definitely within the house) where her masked genius sat, playing his pipe organ. Though the volume was close to bursting her eardrums, she remained in her trance.

**_An insertive A/N: _**An aside about pipe organs. They're effing huge. I mean massive. The smallest pipe organ I've ever seen was only – ONLY – about 14 feet high and about 12 feet wide. Also, they require a bellows to keep airflow moving. In modern times, this is generally done electrically, but in the late 1800s it would have been done by some poor shmo pumping on a big bellows contraption. Why do you think catholic churches had so many acolytes and altar boys? There is no blinking way you'd fit a whole pipe organ into a HOUSE. Especially a house _inside_ the foundations of an opera house. Further, pipe organs are LOUD. No. Really. They're designed to be heard throughout a massive cathedral filled with stinky peasants. **_End of insertive A/N._**

Erik sat at the pipe organ, playing his sorrows away. He had been caring for Christine throughout her illness. She had become ill with no warning signs at all, just as he was spiriting her away into his lair. Yup. Lair, again. Whether or not this spiriting was consensual may vary. There she was, all blushing rose one moment, and then the next she was sweating, screaming, and thrashing the next. Very inconvenient. Of course, it gave him the opportunity to undress her (because we all know that undressing and dressing an unconscious person is _sooo_ easy – especially with no previous experience) and ogle her lithe young (sometimes as young as 14, which is positively CREEPIFIED, in my humble opinion.) body.

Christine sneaked up behind Erik, overawed by his music, and by her view of the _exquisitely, perfectly, Adonis-like, tanned and rugged_ uncovered side of his face and his manly mannish man-body. Never mind that she was a baby-faced virgin freshly woken from a mysterious severe illness – this guy really got her lady-parts all naughty and tingly.

Naturally, Erik sensed her nearness. His lus…I mean…his _love_ for her was so strong that he could tell whenever she entered a room. He began to sing (you know, like ya do, even though no other part of the preceding phic is written in the language or style he now begins to sing) sensually. His voice deepened the spell under which our young heroine was laboring.

insert song of your choice here, complete with aaalllll the lyrics, though the words may not in the least be appropriate to the scene, the characters, or the plot; the preferred song is generally _Music of the Night, _though any hokey love song will do 

Christine was all atremble with fear (or she usually is, if this is an abduction phic) and felt highly averse to the man playing the organ – and yet, her attraction to him grew. Of course, despite her trance-like and fearful state, she was very curious. Just to move the plot along, her hand flashed (she must have been holding some gunpowder) and she removed his mask.

Well, that pissed Erik right off. He was very, very, very, very, very sensitive about his face. I mean, it was a little red and puffy here and there which was dreadfully embarrassing. Or it's possible that he was just embarrassed that he'd gone through the trouble of living in an underground lair (YES, a LAIR), and wearing a mask, and killing people, and so forth just because of a minor skin condition on one quarter of his face. Anyway, he was angry.

Though a moment before he'd been willing to drive white-hot spikes into his eyes for Christine and never previously showed a split second of temper, he suddenly became quite violent. In his blind rage, he roughly grabbed her by her teeny-tiny little fever-wasted arms and threw her across the room. To add insult to injury, he began creatively cursing her alliteratively. He may or may not have tossed some furniture, but we are relatively sure he smashed at least one mirror. We are positive he began to weep. (Weeping #1)

Christine watched his temper tantrum from the floor. She was a bit bruised from her impromptu flight, but otherwise unharmed. Naturally, because it's human nature to feel sorry for the ugly guy who just beat the crap out of you before cursing your eyes, she began to weep (Weeping #2) for Erik's pain. Poor, handsome, angry, angsty Erik! In a feeble attempt to allay his anger, she handed his mask back to him. She was not at all concerned that he might grab her and go for a second round of toss-the-soprano.

Erik took his mask, and realized that his Christine was crying. This wounded him deeply! He dried his eyes and put his arms around her, feeling her warm, womanly (or teenagerly) body and beginning to get a bit worked up. Again, in complete accordance with human nature, Christine continued her sobbing fit while pressing her face to his chest. She did _not_ attempt to pull away and run to safety. No. She trusted her well-being to the crazy man who just lobbed her across the stone flagging of his lair. **Yes! His LAIR!**

Erik looked down at Christine. She was so beautiful and perfect and faultless and innocent and angelic and wonderful and delightful. Her chocolate hair beckoned him. He began to stroke it lovingly, but stopped when the thick, sticky, delicious brown stuff began to melt all over his fingers. She gazed up at him with her chocolate brown eyes. Erik began to feel a bit uneasy – which story was this: Hansel and Gretel or PoTO? With all the chocolate involved, he could no longer be sure.

Anyway, she was beautiful and she was his. Speaking of being his, he noticed that he was very turned on. choose your favorite romance novel euphemism Her clear blue skin and her porcelain eyes were so alluring! (Ever hear the saying, "Her eyes were like saucers?" Well, there ya have.)

Christine was gazing up at him lovingly. Of course she fell in love with him! Don't question it! Character and plot development take _time, _gawdammit, and we're trying to get to the _sex_ as quickly as possible! Like I was saying, she gazed up at him lovingly. She stroked the pretty side of his face, and then she stroked the ugly side of his face. This is the way she shows that she loves him no matter how nearly-ugly a small part of him is. Standard, really.

All her stroking and loving gazing finally broke through his (hitherto un-established, but we'll say it's like that now – for S&G) tough veneer and he wept on her shoulder (Weeping #3) like a baby. As the tears dried up again, he noticed that she was kissing him. A lot. Really hard. In fact, she kissed him so hard that they both fell over. Erik fell backwards, but Christine was unfortunate enough to fall smack onto her face. When they finally sorted themselves out and stood up, her lips were swollen from their passionate kiss (or more likely from her collision with the stone floor)

The sight of her swollen lips enflamed his passion some more, so he scooped her up and carried her to the peculiar swan-bed with its red and black silk sheets. Because their lus…I mean…their love was so deep and their relationship so well-developed, they decided to have sex. They stripped each other insert unimaginative description here and gawked at each other's sexiness. Then, because every **_LAIR_**-living, mask wearing, social hermit has tons of sexual prowess, Erik thrust deeply into her womanly (or teenagerly) womanhood. (He always thrusts. Apparently, the deeper, the better.) As dictated by entirely unreasonable socially indoctrinated expectations of a woman's sexual response to penile penetration, Christine came instantly and very hard. Erik came a few _thrusts_ later. After coming, Erik and Christine wept (Weepings #4and #5). Erik was weeping because Christine had condescended to make the nasty with such a loathsome gargoyle as himself. Christine was weeping for some unknown reason; possibly because she suddenly realized that they'd forgotten the sheepskin condom. Once everyone was done weeping, they cuddled and made small talk.

The next day, Erik fell ill with a fever and Christine nursed him through it. Then they got married and had a baby. They were wonderful parents and lived happily ever after.

**_End A/N: This phic contains many of the painfully overabused clichés and a few of the weather-beaten plot-paths used in some of the worst Victorian era phics I've read. It does NOT contain the very bad writing techniques or egregious spelling and grammar that are all-too-common. Nor does it address the issue of flat or style/time inappropriate dialogue (note the complete absence of dialogue), the shameless practice of review whoring, the dreadful self-insertive Sues, poorly conceived time-travel phics, or 'Phan Meets Phantom and Makes Everything Instantly A-ok' plotlines. No... those I am saving for future additions (or snapshots) to this very Parodying, very Spoofy contribution to ff-net. To give credit where it is due and to brazenly plug my Phanphic Pet Peeves forum: Many of the ideas used herein come from that particular forum. _**


	2. Language, Language

**A Seckind Picshure: Language, Language OR Soignante's Little Language Lesson. **

Rool DeChangy looked though the whole Eric had made in the mirror. The feind was gone. Christine peeked out from behind his shoulder.

"Is he really gone?" she asked.

"Yes," he nodded with a sigh of relief. Him and her could escape now and live at Vicont Raul's estate in teh country.

Chirstine took his hand and followed him to the little boat in the lake. Rual helped her into the small vesel, they climbed in together and then they floated out from the depths of the Oprah House and"Its so good to feel the sunlight again!" she exclaimed.

Rull smiled at her and steered the boat to the shore. "Now, baby, me and you can finally, be together."

"Ok, that sounds wonderful. I love you," Christine hugged Ruoal tightly.

"I love you too, baby." He hugged her back. "Just think soon you will be the Vicountess DeChangy!"

They walked off down teh road together, They did not know that in a dark allay a pair of angry yellow eyes follow there every move.

"I'm going to destroy that fop and if she stays with him I'll destroy her too!" snarled a anguished voice.

Erick ripped the mask from his face and stared at it's flawless white surface. He hated it's feel on his face and his need for it's cover. Now Kristine had unmasked him. Did it matter anymore?

"Its useless," he whispered, and through the offending thing as far as he could without even lookign to see where it landed at. Let the world see his face and no what a monster he really was. Movign from shadow to shadow, Erique followed the couple all the way home.

Christine paused at the deChangy's decorative front door.

"Oh, Ruol! What will you're parent's think of me? I'm just a poor girl from teh Opera house and your a powerful man from a noble family." She began to cry, knowing that his family would never approve of her.

"Your just fine, honey. Just be yourself and have good self esteem and they will love you as much as I do." Tenderly, Roual dried her tears with his handkercheif. "Believe me, Christine, now that I have found you again, I never want to loose you."

"Do you really think they will like me?" she sniffled. "I don't ever want to loose you either."

To answer her question, Ruaol pulled her close and kissed her real hard. Christine kissed him back and they went in the door. Erik sneaked in behind them, quiet as a mousse.

**A/N: _This is my best attempt at demonstrating the devastating effects of bad grammar, bad word choice, and spelling mistakes on an otherwise decent story. Tell yourself this piece of a storyline in your own head, correcting the bad choices and mistakes. See? Nothing wrong with the story at all. I actually had to disable the autocorrect function on my word processor in order to make this many mistakes. As it was, the screen was a swamp of red and green squiggly lines. I do apologize for the brevity of this chapter, but it was too much of an effort to continue writing so poorly. I was hurting my own feelings. _**

**_Let's play a little game: How many mistakes did you find? Here are some _correct_ spellings and usage explanations, if you care to look. _**

**Vicompte (or Viscount) Raoul deChagny – the real title and name of our beloved fop.**

**Christine Daae – Yeah. Her.**

**Whole - entire**

**Hole - the place where nothing is now and something used to be. **

**Fiend - it's an EI IE thing. **

**Comma usage – commas are used to mark off separate elements in a sentence. If you aren't sure of your usage, please look it up. **

"**He and she" are the SUBJECT of the sentence. Use "he and she" when you would use "they". Him and her" are OBJECTS in the sentence. Use "him and her" when you would use "them".**

"**Baby" is not appropriate to the tone of most stories. It comes out very flat. The same goes for "honey." There _are_ stories where it sounds 'right', but not many. **

**The concept of "self-esteem" simply _did not exist_ in the late 1800s. **

**Typos – you can pretty much eliminate these by proofreading and using a Beta. Betas are your friends. This also fixes problems like unfinished. Of course you will have some mistakes, no matter how careful you are. That's ok. Just don't beat your reader to death with them.  
**

**Their - belonging to them.**

**There - that place that is not here. **

**Allay - to calm or pacify.**

**Alley - the space between buildings. **

**A precedes consonants. An precedes vowels. A house. An apple. **

**It's - It is. It's not hard to learn. **

**Its - belonging to it. _Its_ special quality is that _it's_ not the same as other possessives. **

**You're - You are. You are reading my little grammar guide. **

**Your - belonging to you. _Your_ grammar may get better with practice if _you're_ serious about it. **

**Possessives – in most cases (except its and it's and your, as shown above) you just stick an S on the end of a word to make it plural. An apostrophe ( ' ) s indicates ownership. **

**Loose - the opposite of tight. Loose lips sink ships.**

**Lose - to misplace. I will _lose_ my mind if I read one more story with such _loose _grammar use. **

**Mouse - little furry, squeaky creature. **

**Mousse - dessert or hair product. **

"**Real hard" adverb. ADVERB! When you are trying to describe an adjective (a description word) you need an adverb. Most (not all) adverbs end with 'ly'. **

_**I have seen a lot of stories that could have been wonderful, if the grammar, spelling and language had only been fixed. Not everyone is good with spelling and grammar, but everyone on this site has access to the net. Wikipedia has some good grammar guides. will help with spelling. **_

_**Good luck, and good writing to you!**_


	3. Show, Don't Tell

**Show, Don't Tell: A Technique Snapshot. **

Christine had been in Erik's lair for what felt like a very long time. There were no clocks, so she could only guess how long she had been down there by the number of times she got hungry or sleepy. Even though it had been a very long time, she did not mind because Erik was a very good host to her. He made sure she was never bored, lonely, hungry, cold, or sleepy for long. Christine thought to herself that it was odd how easily he seemed to be able to read her mind and her emotions. He often knew she was hungry before she realized it herself!

Today was no different. When she woke that morning, there was already a delicious but simple cottage breakfast of eggs and salt ham on the little kitchen table. She had had dreams about her father, and was therefore feeling very melancholy. Christine aften felt melancholy when her thoughts turned to her father because she had loved him and now he was gone. It seemed that Erik had sensed her feelings of sadness. He knew that she liked to hear him play music, so he was at his piano, playing a tune he thought would make her feel better. She sat quietly, listening to Erik play his heart out on the piano. She liked the way he played, and always enjoyed hearing his music. He played very well and had lots of talent. _ He really is amazing, _she thought. _I think I am falling in love with him. _

She listened attentively for several more minutes to the wonderful music Erik was producing before standing up and walking to his side. She looked at his mask. It was terribly frustrating to always have to look at a piece of porcelain modeled to look like a human face, instead of seeing the real man behind the mask. _I am so conflicted! _Christine thought, conflictedly. She bit her nails ragged because she was very nervous and was continuing to struggle with the choice she had to make. _If I take the mask off without his permission, he is sure to be very angry with me. On the other hand, if I ask him for permission, he will never let me see his face. _

The pretty, confused little soprano debated with herself in this manner for awhile before curiosity overwhelmed her good sense. Her hand moved before her brain could control her actions. The porcelain mask came off with one sharp tug. Christine could not stop herself from screaming when she looked at what was hidden under the mask.

Erik turned around quickly. He was both embarrassed and enraged by what she had done. He felt this way because he had always tried to hide his face from people. When anyone _did_ get a glimpse of his face, they always reacted negatively. He was afraid that Christine would react negatively. If she did, he would be left alone again. Erik had been alone all his life and did not want to be left alone again, especially by the woman he loved. Her scream almost guaranteed that she was responding very badly to seeing his face.

"You wretched girl!" he screamed, showing exactly how angry he was. "How dare you take off my mask, which is my way of hiding my deformity from the world? Now you can see how ugly I am, and I am afraid that you will never be willing to return to my underground lair, which is another way I hide myself from the world.

Christine could not take her eyes off his face. He was very deformed. His face was very unattractive. It frightened her to look at how hideous his face was, with its scars and incongruous coloration. She was still holding his mask in her hands. The sight of his face had shocked her so much that she had forgotten that she was holding it. Not only was Erik's face very deformed and frightening, he was also showing his temper. She could tell that he was furious because of the way he was clenching and unclenching his fists and the heaviness of his breathing – not to mention that he was yelling at her.

"I am sorry!" she cried. It was all she could think to say, because she was so terrified by his aggressive stance and his face.

"Sorry? Sorry!" Erik lifted her up roughly and made her stand very close to him. She was so close to him that she could not help but look at the ravages of his distorted face. "You aren't sorry. You did exactly what you wanted to do, so look at what you have revealed!" Erik was forcing her to look at his face because he figured it didn't matter how he acted. She would hate him anyway now that she had seen his face.

Christine thought about how kind Erik had always been to her in the past. He had taught her to sing, and he had bought her all sorts of pretty dresses. He had shown his trust by bringing her down here to his underground home. After she thought about how kind Erik usually was, Christine came to realize that this behavior was his way of protecting himself from her reaction to him. When she realized this, she stopped being so scared and tried to look as though she weren't in the least bothered by his face. She did this by relaxing in his tight grasp and smiling a little.

**_A/N: If you were reading this and felt vaguely annoyed by the writing style but couldn't say exactly why, don't feel bad. It's a much more subtle thing, which will likely only be funny to those of us who write poetry or those of us who have taken creative writing or drama classes. This is the sin of TELLING instead of SHOWING. It is a sin of which I am occasionally guilty. Which sounds better: (a) Christine was dreadfully frightened when she looked at Erik's face, so she ran away to a corner. OR (b) Christine was shaking so hard she could barely keep her footing as she cautiously backed away to cower helplessly in the corner. The difference in that in sentence (a), I just tell you that Christine is frightened. End of story. In sentence (b) you see that Christine is frightened, even though I don't use the word frightened or any of its synonyms. _**


	4. The Two Phans Scenario

**Two Phans with Ridiculously New-Age Names Who Are Also Best Friends and Sisters Buy A Swan Bed with Christine's Ring in the Headboard Then Decorate Their Room with Christine's Mirror While Listening to the PoTO Soundtrack and Are Mysteriously Thrown Back in Time and into Erik's Lair: A REALISTIC View of What Might Happen**

**_Possibility #1_**

Terra Lune and Raven looked at each other nervously as hazy smoke began to pour out of the mirror. Something was definitely happening – only they did not know _what_. Clinging to one another in fear, the felt the room changing and morphing around them. Suddenly, the air was bone-chillingly damp and their summer-bare feet stood on rough stone. Therosy light which had graced their shared bedroom at home was gone, replaced by a dimness to which their eyes could never quite adjust. They could make out one another's silhouettes and some strange, unidentifiable glimmerings.

Sharpened by lack of vision, their ears took in new and strange sounds. Gone was the familiar hum and buzz of computer and electric lights. Only two sounds, faint and eerie, disturbed the silence. Precariously close to their right they heard the soft sound of water lapping the stone shore. This sound was almost soothing, compared with the loathsome sound of squeaking which could only be produced by rats.

"Wh...whe...where _are_ we?" stammered Terra Lune, clinging shakily to her best-friend/sister's solid body.

"I don't know," whispered Raven, afraid to speak aloud. "By a lake?"

Terra stared into the dark; her eyes wide and bulging with fear and the effort of peering through the dimness. "I think I see a light over there...I think."

Raven looked in the direction indicated. "There is." She stood frozen for a moment before realizing that standing here, shivering into hypothermia was useless. "Let's go."

She took Terra's hand and led her slowly, cautiously over the uneven ground, towards the light. After an agonizingly long while, it became apparent that the light was of the flickering sort that indicated...

"Candles?" whispered Terra.

"God, I hope so," murmured Raven. "Candles mean people."

Hope thus kindled, the two teenagers forged forward. The sight that met their astonished eyes was beyond strange. The light was indeed candles, dozens of them, huge yellowish things set in massive candelabras. No romantic table-candles were these; these were designed to give light for hours. Their light illuminated a pipe-organ built cunningly into the craggy rock face of whatever cave they'd landed in. Never had they imagined that a _real_ pipe-organ would be so massive. It loomed before them, better than 14 feet high.

Though timid, Terra was the brighter of the two. The candles and the organ were 1+1, and when she added them together, they equalled...

"We're in _his lair!_" she whispered excitedly. "We're in Erik's lair!"

Raven blinked, gobsmacked. She was about to reply in the affirmative, when a hissing, angry voice did so for her.

"Oui, vous etes..."

The strange candle-lit scene fell swiftly into darkness as the punjab lasso dropped around her neck, snapping it effortlessly. Terra tried to scream, but no sound emerged. She tried to run, but terror had nailed her feet firmly to the floor. The last thing she saw before death claimed her was the white mask and skeletal frame of her fantasies.

**Possibility #2**

"Wh...whe...where _are_ we?" stammered Terra Lune, clinging shakily to her best-friend/sister's solid body.

Raven looked around at their strange surroundings. A small cottage stood in the middle of a stone island...in the middle of a lake...in a cave...lit by candle light?

"I don't know, Terr." She examined the pipe-organ covered in parchment. She pulled gently out of her best-friend/sister's grasp. Walking slowly, as if in a dream, she explored the area near the organ. Her discoveries there left no doubt.

"You aren't going to believe this, but I think we're in the Phantom's lair..."

"No _way!"_ exclaimed Terra, delighted. "There where is _he_?"

"I don't..."

(_Please note, when Erik speaks, it is always in French. I just don't want to fiddle with correct translations – it's beyond the point.)_

Raven was interrupted by an angry, yet undeniably beautiful male voice yelling in French.

"Who are you! What are you doing here! Get out of my home!"

Neither girl knew a lick of French beyond the numbers and colors and a few other basics from French I. This voice sounded nothing like their teacher's voice. The accent was thick, the pronunciation was fast, and the phraseology was colloquial. The girls whirled to face their aggressor.

It was, without a doubt, Erik. He stood in the door way of his cottage, staring at the two intruders. At first, he had believed that two little street urchin boys had somehow found his way into his home. When they turned around, however, a different truth was revealed. These were _females. _They were in his home...and they were shamelessly dressed – the strange fabric they wore covered very little; their knickers clearly defined the place where their legs met their private areas. He was certain they wore no corsetry. Their hair was his only clue as to their origins. Cut above their shoulders and worn straight, they were clearly escapees from some institution. Caution would be required; such people could be dangerous, even women.

Erik abruptly ceased his tirade. They were staring at him with bizarre grins plastered across their plain faces.

"Madwomen," he muttered to himself. Wanting to preserve their current pleasant demeanor, he adopted an air of absolute courtesy. "Mesdames," he said with a flourishing bow, "Do come in and take some tea..."

Seeing the sudden change of their host's attitude from fury to gentlemanly politeness, the girls' hearts expanded.

"Look!" whispered Terra Lune, "He likes us!"

"Yeah, he's smiling. He keeps talking. What do you think he wants?" Raven whispered back.

Erik sighed with exasperation. He recognized the language as English, one he did not speak fluently. This would make things so much more difficult.

"Mesdames," he said, speaking as slowly as he could, "would...you...like...some...tea?"

The two girls stared at one another.

"He wants us to go inside. Look – he's pointing!" Raven giggled like a small child.

"He said 'the'...that means tea in French. He's inviting us to tea! Come on, Raven!"

Terra grabbed Raven's hand and dragged her into the cottage. Erik closed the door and watched the two girls dash in front of him. They swerved into the kitchen and sat at the breakfast table. Erik stared. Their lives at the asylum must have been strange indeed, if they believed one took her afternoon tea in the kitchen. Even the _English_ knew to take their afternoon tea in the parlor. Still, he did not want to cause any sort of insane behavior by challenging them.

Quickly and quietly the unwilling host lit a fire and boiled the water. He steeped the tea (adding his own special seasoning) and brought it, along with sugar and cream and an assortment of bread and cheese, to the table. The two little hooligans dumped sugar and cream into their cups and poured gargantuan servings of tea. They blew directly on their cups to cool the boiling liquid before grasping the delicate cups in fisted hands. They took the bread directly in their hands, cut large chunks of cheese and placed the cheese between slices of bread in a crude sandwich. Crumbs fell on the table and floor. Erik tried not to stare, but their behavior surpassed barbarism.

"Why is he just sitting there?" Terra wondered aloud, after half her tea was gone.

"He's staring at us," the more sensitive of the two replied, swallowing a bite of bread and gulping the remainder of her tea. "We must be doing something..." suddenly, she giggled. The world had begun doing lazy loops around her head.

Terra watched in consternation as her friend smiled a truly goofy, limp smile and slid down in her chair. Her own vision was blurring and her head began to feel impossibly heavy. Had Erik...? She was asleep before she could finish the thought.

Erik watched with relief and satisfaction as the two strange young women fell asleep. His laudanum supply was diminished, but he could well bear the pain of his 'condition' in return for the returned sanctity of his sanctuary. Swiftly, he set out to contact Madame Giry, who made the arrangements he ordered.

Terra Lune and Raven woke some hours later with raging headaches. Each found herself in a plain bed with a thin straw mattress in a large cold room. Someone had changed their shorts and t-shirts for long, rough nightgowns. There were strange sounds; ravings and gibberings from their fellow inmates in the asylum...


End file.
